Arch 64 or 32 bit?

Question

I have installed arch before on my system about a month ago, but it was kinda slow and sluggish, even though i had a very minimal setup with XFCE.  So I switched back to ubuntu.  However, Ubuntu is giving me a lot of problems right now, and i'm considering going back to arch.  Since I think that the fact that I used a 64 bit arch isntall at first may have caused some compatibility issues, what would you recommend for my system? 
Laptop Specs:
Intel Core2Duo T5250
Intel GMA 965
4GB RAM
Last edited by aznsmartj0ck (2010-08-03 20:18:47)

Answer 1

qchapter wrote:
If you use 32bit only apps like Skype or the Adobe Flash Plugin, the decision is easy: 32bit.  By the way this question has been discussed ad nauseum, please search the forums and the wiki before posting:
https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?pid=502393
http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Arch64_FAQ
This is very wrong. First of all, Skype has a version for 64-bit in the AUR. While it is technically a 32-bit binary, it works. The adobe flash plugin has the last released version in the AUR(although i wouldn't suggest using that for security reasons), or you can use nspluginwrapper at the cost of a little bit of performance, but it also works. You can also use a free version of flash, like lightspark player or gnash. Or you could just use a chroot to install a bundled 32-bit system in your 64-bit version.(Which is what I use.)
But I do agree that you should search the forums and wiki.